Gary Neville believes Manchester City’s poor record away against Liverpool can be explained by their failure to handle the Anfield ‘washing machine’.
Pep Guardiola and Jurgen Klopp’s latest Premier League encounter saw their sides play out a breathless encounter in the latest twist in the title race.
John Stones gave the Citizens the lead, only for Alexis Mac Allister to level the game from the penalty spot just after the break, with both teams squandering countless opportunities to win the game late on.
The result saw Arsenal remain top of the table after their late win over Brentford on Saturday evening but the result also extended Guardiola’s lacklustre record at Anfield.
The Spaniard has now visited Anfield on nine occasions since Klopp has been in charge but has managed just one single victory back in February 2021 – and that was during Covid.
Despite their incredible league record, Neville said he was surprised that Guardiola and his side are yet to learn how to keep the Anfield crowd at bay and kill off the game as early as possible.
‘I said at half-time that City could regret the way in which they approached the last 15 minutes of the first half,’ he said on his Sky Sports podcast. ‘I don’t know why they do it here, I don’t know why they’ve not learnt.
‘They’re a brilliant team, one of the best we’ve ever seen, but they went 1-0 up and then started to relax on the ball. They started to walk to throw-ins, reduce their tempo and rhythm they were in and rely upon. You just invite this mayhem and chaos.
‘I once described Anfield as being like thrown in a washing machine, tumbled around. That’s how it used to be like for us sometimes. You can be going ok and then your world caves in all around you.
‘The big disappointment for Pep Guardiola will be from the first goal going until half-time. That’s the period of the game where they I thought they could have gone for it. They started ambling in the game, almost like killing the clock.
‘You can’t kill the clock here. They won’t go quiet this lot, they always come back. You’ve got to go and get the second goal. You’ve got to believe you need that second and then the third. You’re never safe in this ground.
‘You can’t let moments drift. You might let the clock run down with three minutes to go, but you can’t do it with 65 minutes to go and that’s what I felt City tried to do.
‘Once you stop doing that, you’ve got a tidal wave coming towards you and that’s what they had in the second half. Waves of pressure and you can’t stop it then because once they have that at Anfield, it’s very difficult to turn it around.’
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